Editors attack closure of media training foundation

THE closure of a foundation that taught some of the world’s leading journalists raises questions about the European Commission’s media training policy, one of its former editors claims.

European Voice

2/5/03, 5:00 PM CET

Updated 4/12/14, 8:37 AM CET

The Paris-based Journalists in Europe (JE) foundation posted the final edition of its magazine on the internet in December and went into liquidation last month.

The NGO, which has trained journalists from more than 100 countries since its formation 28 years ago, was crippled by a change in the Commission’s training policy, says Jonny Jacobsen, an editor with the foundation for three years.

“The Commission’s decision to switch media funding to short courses of up to a week or two spelled the end for JE.

“The foundation’s main programme lasted eight months and even its shorter modules exceeded the new limits.

“Commission funding made up half the foundation’s €900,000 budget so,

despite backing from several European governments, the Reuters Foundation, Deutsche Bank and others, there was no way it could make up the shortfall.”

Journalists linked to the foundation include some of the leading names in the profession. Ireland’s Maggie O’Kane, 2002 Journalist the Year in the EV50 awards, passed through its doors.

So too did Stephen Jessel, former editor of the foundation’s magazine Europ, who has been coordinating a campaign against its closure. In a scathing editorial in the final issue, he wrote: “We say adieu with some bitterness…it seems extraordinary that at a time when the Union is seeking to establish itself on the world stage – and convince the rest of the planet that it is

not an inward looking, selfish rich man’s club – steps should be taken to reinforcejust that impression, by ending courses attended by hundreds of people from emerging countries in Africa, Asia and elsewhere.”

The foundation was the brainchild of charismatic journalist and French resistance hero Philippe Viannay, who set it up in 1974, along with Gerald Long, former managing director of the Reuters news agency, and Hubert Beuve-Méry, founder of Le Monde.

Participants received thorough grounding in European affairs through lectures, group trips and reporting assignments.

Antonis Papacostas, of the Commission’s press and communications directorate,

insists the decision to change funding policy was not made lightly.

It came about only after an internal study to assess the Commission’s needs, he said. Under the new system, shorter courses will be tailor-made to meet the specialist requirements of different groups of journalists.

“The object is to show journalists how the Commission and the institutions work. And more journalists will benefit from these kinds of seminars.”

The Commission also preferred to back organisations that could eventually achieve financial autonomy, he says: not something the foundation ever managed.

Journalists and members of the European Parliament were among

those who criticised the Commission’s funding for the foundation, he adds.

“We don’t want to support one school and not another one because it is